Exo Labs Links iPads, Microscopes To Modernize Science Education

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Exo Labs wants to turn the iPad—proliferating in schools like generations of Apple products before it—into a platform for science education, both in the classroom and in the field.

The Seattle-area hardware startup, which landed $640,000 from angel investors in December and a clutch of recognition through local startup competitions last fall, plans to begin shipping its first product, the Focus Microscope Camera, later this month. The aluminum-clad device, about the size of a deck of cards, fits onto the eyepiece of a microscope, outputting the image to an iPad or iPhone.

It moves microscopy from a solitary, hunched-over endeavor to a wide-angle, interactive, group activity. Instead of taking turns at the eyepiece, wondering whether you’re seeing the object of interest or a speck of dust on the slide, everyone can effectively use the microscope—or a range of other imaging devices—together simultaneously.

With the Exo app, you can make measurements on the image—how many microns is that cell’s diameter?—add annotations, manipulate it, and share it all in real-time.

Exo’s initial focus is on K-12 and university science classrooms, where its device could be the link between existing equipment and new technology.

“These things are magic, and nobody is taking advantage of the power of these because getting data into them is hard,” Baum says. “But man, once you get data into it, it’s amazing.”

Exo has big aspirations beyond the initial device, melding the portability and power of the iPad and iPhone—and, perhaps eventually, other mobile devices—with scientific tools.

“We’re thinking about this as the dashboard of your science education experience, pulling in other devices and other sensors so you could time-stamp and serialize them all,” Stewart says.

Imagine taking temperature and ph samples while examining aquatic micro invertebrates in a stream, and tagging the observations with the exact time and location via your phone’s GPS. That’s what gets Stewart and Baum really excited, although there are a lot of pieces still to fall in place—including a portable all-in-one microscope Exo aims to release within a year, which Baum describes as a “take-your-kid-to-the-beach product.”

With its first product, Exo is building for the lab.

The Focus Microscope Camera uses a wired connection rather than wifi or Bluetooth because occupying the former would block the device’s connection to the Internet and the latter does not provide sufficient fidelity for examining images through a microscope.

“We intentionally chose to connect with a cable initially,” Baum says. “If we were doing this wirelessly, then the resolution would be way lower, and the speed at which we could interact with these images would be way slower.”

Exo is keeping the details of the connection to iOS devices’ 30-pin dock connector (and Lightning connector on the latest versions)—including data transfer rates—under wraps, because of confidentiality agreements with Apple and to protect what Exo sees as a competitive advantage.